New app remaps the Pixel 2’s strangest feature

The Google Pixel 2 phones come with a feature that’s only available on one other device, the HTC U11. Google’s Active Edge only does a couple of things, at least officially. Its main purpose is to invoke the Google Assistant with a simple squeeze, although it can also silence incoming calls.

Android power-users who’d like to map it to something else are officially out of luck. That is, Google doesn’t allow it, so the official Settings app will not help you in that regard. However, there is an application that will let you remap the button to something else.

Creaded by xda-developers’ member flar2, the Button Mapper app lets you map any physical button of a phone to a particular action, different than its default purpose.

The developer updated the app to allow Pixel 2 users to trigger other actions on the phone instead of the Google Assistant.

You can replicate everything on your phone by following the instructions available at this link. It’s not that complicated, but it’s not a hassle-free process. But once completed, you’ll be able to use Active Edge for whatever action you desire, as long as it’s supported by the Button Manager application.

Mind you, the squeeze still triggers the Assistant, and the app forces the phone to go to the home screen to shut it down, but it all happens so fast that you shouldn’t notice it.

For it to work, the app actually reads the logs to know when you squeeze the frame, which means it needs to be granted sensitive permissions. But if you really want to remap your Active Edge to something else, this is the only way to do it, for now.